


It's Better This Way

by Catchclaw



Series: Mental Mimosa [126]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Artist Loki (Marvel), M/M, Neighbors, Strangers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-29
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-07-04 03:30:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15832860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catchclaw/pseuds/Catchclaw
Summary: There’s clay stuck between his fingers. There’s probably clay in his hair.





	It's Better This Way

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Pottery studio. Prompt from this [generator](http://colormayfade.tumblr.com/generator).

There’s clay stuck between his fingers. There’s probably clay in his hair. There are bits of it, at the very least, clinging to the back of his neck, his forearms, the crushed petal front of his t-shirt. That’s the problem with clay, with throwing pottery: it’s messy in an immediate way. Paint dries, glue hardens, but clay has a three-dimensional quality that gives its remains a substantiality that makes it harder to wash off, all the more difficult to ignore.

Loki’s used to it, being constantly covered in the stuff. Even at home, miles in space and mental distance from his studio, the little corner of the collective he rents, he always smells like clay, is always covered in the scent of pliable earth. Some days, the floor of the shower is stained red; others, a molten gray, and most days, he’s grateful that he lives alone.

Most days. Not always.

When he catches a glimpse of his neighbor, for instance, Mr. Tall, Blond, and Kindly, he sometimes feels a little twinge, as if he’s a resined bow shaken too soundly, the hairs of his whole coming apart, breaking free of their carefully crafted unity. It’s not the man’s beauty alone that shakes him, though the quick sky eyes are nothing to sneeze at, nor the body that peeks out from running shorts in the evenings and slumbers under suit jackets during the day: legs like strong trees and a chest a mile wide. It’s that the guy is everyday kind, the sort of person who holds doors without thinking, who helps the older couple down the hall tote in their groceries, who speaks as warmly to dogs and (ugh) to the occasional child as he does to the rich lesbians in 8F who own the only Mercedes in the building, the only ones brave enough to park it in the back lot.

So far as Loki can tell, in their admittedly limited interactions, the guy is _good_ , a genuinely nice guy who’s not kind for profit or for some personal gain--he seems to like people, to want to help them, and honestly, in Loki’s life, in this city? It’s like living on the same floor as an alien. A big, gorgeous creature from another planet who doesn’t understand how things work, how the world really is: abrupt and demanding and designed to profit those who stay in their lanes, who stick to a particular capitalistic track, one that puts self above all and leaves little time for connection, romantic or otherwise.

Not that Loki looks at this man and thinks romance or boyfriend or long-lasting connection--though in his heart of dark hearts, Loki desperately desires those things. There are nights when he lies alone in his trim twin bed and imagines arms wound around him, a wet drag of a kiss against the back of his neck, the warm hum of someone else’s voice murmuring words of affection that lull him down into dreams. There are days when he can’t bear to look at couples of any kind, any flavor; days when the flash of someone else’s happiness in love turns his stomach grim and sour. There are weeks when all his pots come out with sharp angles, when his lonely fingers forget how to throw elegant curves.

Yes, Loki’s heart is aching, although he's loathe to deny it. So he focuses instead on lust, on turning every glimpse of his beautiful neighbor, every ridiculous skip of his heart, into an excuse for self-pleasure. It’s not so difficult; indeed, sometimes it’s too easy. Sometimes, they’ll share an elevator to the lobby and the man--whom Loki’s decided to think of as Thor, the guy’s given name be damned--will smile and nod and stand appropriately far away and much the fuck too close and Loki will have to will himself still in the subway, to keep his satchel strung across the front of his body, to run from the subway to his studio, the tiny closet in the back, and then free himself from his jeans and jerk off frantic and furtive, biting his lip to keep quiet, closing his eyes to better see the man’s face, to better remember the scent of his cologne, the curve of his easy smile. He imagines being folded beneath both, his legs bent, his body full, the man sighing against his cheek and turning that smile over and over Loki’s own.

 _I don’t even know your name,_ this imagined Thor breathes, swelling inside of Loki, on the edge of a break.  _Why won’t you tell me?_

And in his mind, in the moments before Loki shatters the morning, the instant before he comes, he says to himself, to Thor: _Trust me. It’s better this way_.

When you know people, they disappoint you. Invariably. It’s the way of the fucking world.

But when you hold them at bay, let the possibility of who they are, their promise, balance in the palm of your hand, then they’re at your command and they can never fail you.


End file.
